Textile machines, especially spinning machines, with automatic spool changes are known in the art in various inplementations, in which like winding devices are arranged in tiers and in which there are provided horizontal spool spindles, a spool changing carriage traversable along the machine and a spool conveyor traversable along the machine independently of the spool changing carriage.
These spool changers serve to take the fully wound spools, i.e. the finished spools, off their spool holders, for example spool spindles, and place them on a spool transporting device, for example, a carriage or an endless conveyor. Beyond this the automatic spool changer also assumes the function of supplying the spool spindles with new spools from an empty spool storage device, for instance an empty spool magazine, an empty spool transport carriage or an endless conveyor.
An embodiment of such a spool changing arrangement has been disclosed, for example, in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 260,454, filed by Munnekehoff et al. on June 7, 1972, and now abandoned and corresponding to German published patent application No. DT-OS 2,128,974. This application shows a textile machine with one or more tiers of similar winding devices, a spool changing carrier which may be traversed along the textile machine and may be arrested in front of the textile machine in predetermined positions, and a spool conveyor which is traversable independently of the spool changing carriage. The spool changing carriage comprises means for taking off the finished spools and slipping on the empty spools.
Such an arrangement of textile machine, spool changing carriage and spool conveyor, which is distinguished by the fact that these three units are disposed, and are movable, in one plane side by side have proven themselves for textile machines for the processing of filaments, for example, crimp and false-twisting machines, without exhibiting any significant disadvantages for these machine types.
In other types of machines, especially spinning machines, spin stretching machines and stretch winding machines for synthetic yarns, this arrangement of the above-named three units entails, however, considerable drawbacks. Such machines are operated today at the highest thread velocities which may lie beyond 1,000 m/min and may reach more than 4,000 m/min. Frequently the freshly spun and/or stretched fiber material is highly sensitive. It tends to form lumps or defects in godets and winding devices. For economic reasons spools with a high filling ratio and a high spool weight, for example, 32 kilograms, are produced, particularly in the form of cylindric spools. The denier of the threads thus produced must always be chosen to conform to the changing requirements of the market. Because of all of these reasons it appears disadvantageous to locate the traversing paths of spool-changing carriages and spool conveyors in the service aisle of these machines. For this has the drawback that passage through the service aisle tends to be obstructed. Furthermore, the loose association of textile machine, spool changing carriage and spool conveyor does not permit either close service tolerances or the velocities which are necessary in order that the finished spools may be safely exchanged for empty spools within the technically imposed time limitations.